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While the importance of information system (IS) certifications to demonstrate compliance with security and personal data protection requirements is constantly increasing, competing (theoretical) viewpoints exist that outline the rationales for organizations to adopt certifications. The results of these competing perspectives are inconclusive research findings in the certification adoption literature. While organizations may use certifications to signal quality to consumers, others mainly adopt certifications to improve internal processes or create institutional legitimacy. To enhance our understanding of the motivation for online vendors to adopt IS certifications, we conduct a literature review and a ranking‐type Delphi study with two unique panels comprising certified online vendors (N = 15) and certification authorities (N = 24). As a result, we provide a rank‐order list of 24 motivators and 17 demotivators impacting online vendors’ intentions to adopt IS certifications. We reveal that certain motives are context‐independent, whereas other motives are specific for electronic markets (e.g., “signal data protection”). We also provide rich descriptions of potential demotivators, thereby increasing our understanding of the boundary conditions for IS certification adoption. Comparing our findings to three competing theoretical perspectives enabled us to derive a typology of distinctive certification adopters: functionalists, institutionalists, and signalers. In developing this typology, our findings constitute a first step toward alleviating the inconclusive findings in the academic literature as well as highlighting differences in motivating and inhibiting factors that impact vendors’ adoption intentions.

Web assurance seals are actions taken by e-commerce vendors to increase their trustworthiness and alleviate consumers' concerns. In their essence, web assurance seals are a product of negotiations, adoptions, and settlements among various groups of interests (e.g., seal authorities, vendors, consumers, or governmental institutions). However, previous research has hitherto used a unilateral research perspective when studying web assurance seals (i.e., either consumer-or vendor-centric), which has acted as a gridlock for web assurance seal literature development. Drawing on signaling theory, we use a ranking-type Delphi study with three distinct, yet mutually supportive expert panels (N = 60) to compare vendors' intentions to acquire web assurance seals and perceived effects by consumers. Our results uncover a mismatch between consumers' perceptions and vendors' intentions of web assurance seals, unintended side effects as well as vendors targeting other stakeholders than consumers, ultimately providing starting points for research to move forward.

Despite being widely used in practice and often asserted to be an effective trust-building mechanism, little empirical evidence exists regarding the effect of identity verification on sharing economy platforms. We theoretically develop a model based on signaling theory to explain how identity verification strengthens users' intention to engage in sharing economy transactions by increasing the level of trust towards a verified transaction partner. To test our hypotheses, we design a between-subject online experiment comparing subjects' perceptions of identity-verified and non-verified user profiles on an accommodation sharing platform. Data was collected from 232 participants and analyzed using covariance-based structural equation modeling. We found identity verification to significantly increase transaction intention, while its effect was mediated by trust in the transaction partner. Moreover, trust disposition was found to be a significant antecedent of users' transaction intentions. We discuss our findings and provide implications for theory and practice.